That stopped him in his tracks. He took half the blanket and draped it over his shoulders, meaning it lifted off one of hers as he was so much taller. But she didn’t care. They were as dry as could be, given the circumstances, and for now, they couldn’t see or hear the enemy. It wasn’t dark yet, but she knew it would be soon, and she strained to adjust her eyes to the fading light. Cate’s foot slid from beneath her on the mud, but she managed to quickly right herself.

“I have no idea how long it takes to walk fifty miles,” she confessed as they set off slowly, side by side.

“A long while,” Jack replied, but from the grunt that came along with it, she realized it wasn’t going to be easy for him and they hadn’t even walked a quarter of a mile yet.

“Lean on me,” she offered, ignoring his protest as she slipped an arm around his waist. Cate refused to be embarrassed about touching him or pressing her own body so close; surely they were past that by now. They were two people doing their best to survive, and she needed to forget any romantic thoughts she may or may not have had about him in the past.

“We can do this, Jack,” she whispered up at him. “We’re not dying tonight. Not here. We’re going to make it.”

She was answered with silence, but when his arm slid around her shoulders, letting her take some of his weight, it was all she needed, just to know that he believed the same. They’d survived so far, and that was all the evidence she had that they could stay that way. And so they kept walking, connected at the hip, as they bumped along in the dark toward Le Paradis, wherever that might be.

CHAPTER FIVE ADELAIDE

CHAPTER FIVE

ADELAIDE

Adelaide couldn’t stop shaking. It had started when they were upstairs under the bed hiding, and ever since her body had trembled as if she were shivering from the cold. She glanced over at her sister, who was busying herself in the kitchen, preparing a meager meal for the pair of them, and even though she knew she should help, she couldn’t seem to move.

She shut her eyes for a moment then quickly opened them, the sight of all those men walking out with their hands held high coming straight back to her, their little white flag on a stick. Boom. She kept hearing that, too, the loud explosions as they were gunned down, one after the other after the other.

“You need to do something to keep your mind off it all,” Elise said.

Addy looked up at her sister and nodded. She was right—Elise always was.

“Set the table for me,” Elise suggested. “The soup is almost ready.”